Dish vs Hulu test drive

[omeletpants]

I have been a Dish subscriber since 2005 and love the service and think the DVR and guide is elegant. I currently pay $105/mo for 200 channels a Hopper 3 and 2 Joeys. My subscription is up in March and I have been reading the comments about Dish getting tougher with pricing and deals. I'm not willing to pay any increase over my current price. I expecting the new price to be about $140

So, I started investigating Hulu and signed up for a trial subscription. I don't like the picture quality. I have a 1gb cable connection. The picture was electric and incredibly contrasty. Switching back and forth from the football game tonight the grass on Hulu was neon and electric while Dish was natural. Even my wife who would be happy with SD thought it looked terrible and said the Hulu picture hurt her eyes. The Hulu dvr was clumsy and I had to click 3 times as much to maneuver channels and it forced me to confirm my decision to change channels (WTF). I would also give up a couple of local channels on Hulu as I'm too far away to use an outside antenna

Except for price, I don't see a single advantage in Hulu over Dish. I was a corporate negotiator for 40 years so I will see if I can keep my price the same come March

 

[sam_gordon]

My sister & BiL have Hulu and we watched some football this weekend. The colors looked normal to me. The only image issues I saw was fast motion seemed to stutter or strobe, just wasn't quite smooth. But no issues with color.

You might want to check your input settings on the tv.

 

[omeletpants]

It's not the TV. I have a very high end LCD properly tuned and the colors and picture via Dish is fabulous. But on Hulu it's "electric" and oversaturated. My wife said it would give her a headache it was that bad

 

[Bobby]

It might be the input on the TV that might have some adjustments. Are you going directly to the TV or through an AVR first?

 

[omeletpants]

It might be the input on the TV that might have some adjustments. Are you going directly to the TV or through an AVR first?

I'm using a downloaded app on my android based Sony

 

[lgb0250]

Haven’t found a streaming service that we like very well yet. Have tried Sling, YTTV and PSVue (gone now). It’s just hard for me to change UI’s. That’s why we renewed With DISH about a year ago. When this two yr contract is up we might revisit this option since we are paying $108 now with H3 and one Joey And the Top200 package.

 

[HipKat]

I'm using a downloaded app on my android based Sony

Have you gone through the Calibration settings? Which model Sony do you have?
Although with these Sony's they're pretty good out of the box.
I don't use Hulu but I do other apps and they look spectacular.

Here are the settings for the Sony X900H/X90H

Sony X900H Calibration Settings

We used the following calibration settings to review the Sony 55" X900H (XBR55X900H).

www.rtings.com

 

[Ronnie-]

Sounds like the picture settings for your TV built in apps is set to "vivid" or "Bright" or something similar, where as your dish input settings are set differently.

 

[TheKrell]

Does Hulu stream in 4K? This sounds like an HDR issue.

 

[Ronnie-]

Does Hulu stream in 4K? This sounds like an HDR issue.

I would assume he is talking about live tv, in that case it wouldnt be HDR.

 

[TheKrell]

I would assume he is talking about live tv, in that case it wouldnt be HDR.

Huh. You might think that Hulu would get their own app right. Perhaps it doesn't understand the Sony's settings and gets the HDR set wrong, e.g. turning it on when it doesn't exist on the broadcast.

 

[Ronnie-]

Huh. You might think that Hulu would get their own app right. Perhaps it doesn't understand the Sony's settings and gets the HDR set wrong, e.g. turning it on when it doesn't exist on the broadcast.

I dont think that is the case, and if it were I would say it was a sony issue. There would be nothing in the hulu feed to turn on HDR that doesnt exist in the live broadcast.

There are some devices that have settings to convert SDR to HDR all the time. I dont know if a Sony TV has that setting built in, some android tv/Google tv devices do.

I still think it is more of an input mode setting being different between his Dish input at the built in tv OS "Input".

 

[Radioguy41]

Sounds like the picture settings for your TV built in apps is set to "vivid" or "Bright" or something similar, where as your dish input settings are set differently.

Exactly. My Sony has seperate settings for every input plus live and streaming. How the input for Dish is set has nothing to do with how the others are set. It sounds very much like it's set to "Vivid" when streaming.

 

[rvvaquero]

Come on guys. OP is trying to justify staying with DISH at a higher price and you guys are messing with his decision.

 

[Radioguy41]

A good decision is an informed decision. (Messing with people's minds is just a perk).

 

[omeletpants]

Have you gone through the Calibration settings? Which model Sony do you have?
Although with these Sony's they're pretty good out of the box.
I don't use Hulu but I do other apps and they look spectacular.

Here are the settings for the Sony X900H/X90H

Sony X900H Calibration Settings

We used the following calibration settings to review the Sony 55" X900H (XBR55X900H).

www.rtings.com

I have a top of the line Sony Z9F that is perfectly calibrated and looks great on Dish, Netflix and Disney. It's not the TV and I'm not going to redo all the settings to accommodate the horrible picture on Hulu

 

[Bobby]

I have a top of the line Sony Z9F that is perfectly calibrated and looks great on Dish, Netflix and Disney. It's not the TV and I'm not going to redo all the settings to accommodate the horrible picture on Hulu

Just to be clear, you have your Hopper hooked up to you Sony Z9F with an HDMI cable and you watch Netflix and Disney+ using downloaded apps on the Sony?

 

[ethanlerma]

Another question to the OP, do you notice this color palette/image quality problem on Hulu with on demand content, like movies and series? Reason I ask is because I use the normal Hulu subscription from time to time on everything from my phone (iP 12 PM, OLED) to PC (1440p monitor, VA) to TV (Mid range Samsung, LED), and have never noticed anything you are describing. For all I know you could be right and it’s just that there encoding of live TV feeds suck. But if you notice the same issues on demand then I’m more inclined to believe it’s your setup like everyone else is suggesting.

 

[Bobby]

Another question to the OP, do you notice this color palette/image quality problem on Hulu with on demand content, like movies and series? Reason I ask is because I use the normal Hulu subscription from time to time on everything from my phone (iP 12 PM, OLED) to PC (1440p monitor, VA) to TV (Mid range Samsung, LED), and have never noticed anything you are describing. For all I know you could be right and it’s just that there encoding of live TV feeds suck. But if you notice the same issues on demand then I’m more inclined to believe it’s your setup like everyone else is suggesting.

I am assuming the OP is trialing Hulu Live TV as opposed to just the Hulu app.

 

[Ronnie-]

I am assuming the OP is trialing Hulu Live TV as opposed to just the Hulu app.

It uses the same app.